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Friday, April 03, 2009

Bacon Cheeseburger Pizza...

*A note before we get to today's post. Jeff and I have signed up for the Humane Society Walk on May 2nd in memory of Spike. I know times are tough, but we would welcome any donation if you would like to support us, please check out our donation site!

For this week's Friday Night Pizza, I wasn't looking for anything fancy or crazy... we were just in the mood for a basic, comforting and cheesy pizza that had a little zip. And if we didn't need to pick up any ingredients for it, all the better! After taking a few glances through the pantry and freezer, we decided that a Bacon Cheeseburger Pizza sounded right up our alley.

No surprise, I did get right to business this evening by getting our favorite whole-wheat pizza dough quickly prepared in the food processor and off to rise while I prepped the toppings. For those, I cooked a few slices of salty bacon since I needed them crisp later on and because I had plans to use a little of those naughty drippings that get left behind. I did try to show some restraint and didn't use all that rich fat, but I did save a couple teaspoons worth to brown a half pound of ground sirloin and soften a cup's worth of chopped onion. If you'd rather not use the bacon drippings, a splash of canola or olive oil would be fine.

To add a saucy edge, we added a generous amount of homemade pizza sauce that had been in the freezer - however, use whatever tomato product you think would work here. A homemade marinara would be nice or even a prepared sauce if you didn't already have some handy - whatever it would take to get you excited about making your own pizzas! And, if you like mustard on your burgers, why not think about stirring a few tablespoons into the mix for a tangy bite?

Now that the beefy portion was ready, I stretched out the crust to a large round - since we wanted a very crisp crust tonight, I tossed the dough onto a hot pizza stone for a few minutes to give it a head start before we started adding the toppings. After spreading out the saucy beef concoction, we added shreds of both mozzarella and sharp white cheddar cheeses over the top. We crumbled those bacon slices we crisped up earlier and scattered those on top as the finishing touch. Slid back onto the stone, the pizza needed less than 15 minutes to finish browning the thin crust and melting the cheeses.

Bacon? Check... Lots of cheese? Check... Zesty sauce studded with beefy crumbles? Check... This definitely met our requirements for an easy pizza tonight and then some! Can you guess what we'll be doing for breakfast in the morning? You can bet that we each saved a couple slices to devour tomorrow!

That sounds gooooood! We've had some fun experimental pizzas lately (including one using leftover fried chicken!), and I was just saying we needed to use up the mozz in the fridge (plus I think we have some bacon!).

So we have a pizza stone as well, but I never try to get my crust perfectly round these days, just going for a more "rustic" look. How do you slide a perfectly round RAW dough onto the stone without deforming it? And then do you remove the crust from the oven, partially baked, to top it, or do you slide the tray out and leave the dough on the stone, or...?

Jeph - I use cornmeal on the peel, which helps to ease the dough onto the stone. However, you can also form the dough onto a piece of parchment paper, slide the whole shebang onto the stone and give it 2 or 3 minutes. After that, you can slide the paper right out (the dough will have cooked just enough to release) from underneath the dough and let the crust have direct contact with the hot stone to crisp.

For this pizza, I let it cook just a few minutes so the bottom was faintly browned. I took it out (the stone stays in the oven), flipped it over (browned side gets the toppings) and slide it back onto the stone to finish baking. This makes for an excellent crispy crust!

Oh this was good! I was planning on making something else for dinner, but after seeing the photo there was a last-minute change. I didn't have any sauce so I threw in a can of undrained diced tomaotes and it didn't seem any worse for wear.

My husband isn't a huge pizza lover, and I still heard: 'This is a make again!' 10 out of 10-thanks for a yummy dinner!

Had to tell you that this was quite possibly one of the best homemade pizzas I have ever made! I nearly doubled the ingredients because I made a giant pizza, and the only White Cheddar I had in the fridge was the mild variety, but it was still amazing. We had two slices left and I just noticed that the hubby swiped them for his lunch today...but he will pay. :-p Thanks Joe!